Sports reporter //

After South Africa batted first and were all out for 106 runs, the fate of the match was basically confirmed. Afghanistan has never lost a match chasing below 129 runs, similarly South Africa has not won a match with such a low collection. Today is no exception.

In the first ODI in Sharjah, Afghanistan anchored the port of victory by stopping South Africa for 106 runs. Along with 6 wickets at the time of victory, Afghans also had 144 balls. As a result, the Afghans tasted defeat to South Africa for the first time in any version of cricket.

Two bowlers, pacer Fazalhaq Farooqui and spinner Mohammad Ghazanfar, built the foundation of victory for Afghanistan at the beginning of the day. These two basically crushed the top order of the Proteas. South Africa lost 7 wickets for 36 runs. After that, South Africa could not return to the match even after trying. Afghanistan lead the three-match series 1–0.

Chasing the target of 107 runs in a low scoring match, Rahmanullah Gurbaz returned without scoring any runs in the first over. Then Rahmat Shah (8) went back to the team’s 15 runs and Afghanistan came under pressure. But after that two Afghan batsmen Riyaz Hasan and Hashmatullah Shahidi started batting cautiously. Riaz (16) went back to the team’s 38 runs.

However, captains Hashmatullah and Azmatullah Omarzai slowly started to take the team to a safe position. The pair broke when Hashmatullah returned for the team’s 60 runs. But after that, Omarzai and Gulbadin Naib did not allow Afghanistan to be in danger. The two remained unbroken and took Afghanistan to the port of victory. Azmatullah remained unbeaten on 25 and Naib on 34 runs.
Earlier, after winning the toss in Sharjah, South Africa fell into a terrible batting disaster. The Protea batsmen had no answer to Farooqui and Ghazanfar’s bowling. Farooqui started the destruction by sending back Riza Hendricks (9) for the team’s 17 runs. After that, the Proteas top order was only in procession. Among South Africa’s first six batsmen, only Tony De Georgi (11) and Kyle Verenne (10) reached double figures.
At the end of 10 overs, South Africa were 36 for 7. Farooqui and Ghazanfar shared 6 of these 7 wickets. At that time, South Africa’s 50 runs seemed like a difficult task to climb the top of Everest. Wien Mulder and Björn Fortun pulled the team out of that disaster. These two together took the team to 75 runs. Then Fortune returned with 16 runs. Although wickets continued to fall at one end, Mulder led the team to 100 runs at the other end. In his 52 runs, South Africa finally got capital of 106 runs. For Afghanistan Farooqui took 4 wickets, Ghazanfar took 3 wickets.

In addition to making history with this great victory, Afghanistan also got the confidence to win the series. The second match of the series is on Friday at 12 noon.